Ancient Rome in Jordan

Friday morning was our last full day in Jordan.  With the current COVID-19 restrictions that remained in the US, this required us to get a negative COVID test the day before our flight.  Fortunately, the Dead Sea Hilton had a contract with a doctor that would come and administer the test onsite and return the results the same day.  We had an appointment mid-morning, which gave us a little bit of time to take the morning easy, and check out the dead sea.

The hectic pace of the trip and cold was catching up with Aimee and she decided to rest a bit in the room while I ran down to grab breakfast at the buffet.  I did a "fly around" of the extensive buffet before grabbing a few basic items, and sat back down.  With the frequent travel I do for work, I am a Hilton Diamond status member.  Most of the time, this simply gets me some extra bottles of water, a snack, perhaps free hot breakfast, depending on the hotel.  This time, it gave me celebrity status.  Once I sat down a continual flow of staff every couple minutes came past my table, thanking me for my loyalty, welcoming me to the hotel, and asking if there was anything they could get for me.  This included the manager, perhaps a chef, and several other of the staff, to the point that I began to be a little bit self-conscious of the attention I was getting.  As I was finishing up the last few items on my plate, one of the staff came over, again thanking me for my Hilton loyalty, and asked if I had tried knafeh yet in Jordan.  I admitted I had not.   She excitedly said "let me get you a slice".  She ran off and only seconds later, returned with a slice of some sort of a pastry that had a sticky/gooey sweet top layer with some pistachio crumbles on it, with some sort of cheese middle layer that seemed to have a consistency somewhere between warm pizza cheese and taffy on top of a crust.  It was very tasty though quite sweet and quite heavy, especially after having just finished a full breakfast.  

After finishing off my knafeh, I tried to get up quickly before I was fed more. I grabbed a couple snacks to bring up to Aimee and headed back up to the room.

We still had a bit of time before the doctor would be there, and had planned to use this time to run down to the Dead Sea.  The Dead Sea is the lowest point on the face of the earth.  If you're not aware, it is the final resting spot of the Jordan River and after thousands of years of the Jordan River entering into it and evaporating, it has extremely high salinity (and the lands and plains around it are resultingly rich in salt and potash, the farming of which is a very visible key industry around the Dead Sea).  Interestingly, due to irrigation and other diversion of the water that feeds into the Dead Sea over the last few decades, it is evaporating faster now than it is filling.  This is clear all along the cost line, as its beaches have the look of a large puddle that has been slowly drying up since a rain storm several days ago, with fairly clear edges and rings around it where the sea used to be.  Even being on the coast of the Dead Sea, in order to get to it from our room, we had to take a few flights of stairs down to the pool area, and then take an elevator quite a bit further down to get to the beach access.  

View of Dead Sea from the Hilton

The beach was fairly small, with a steep slope down to the waters edge with several chairs and umbrellas lined up along the way.  At the back were a few tables where they had Dead Sea mineral messages.  There was only one other hotel guest in the area, wading up to his mid-torso in the small roped off area of the water.  We asked the attendant from the massage tables what we were meant to do, and he explained that we should soak in the waters for 15 minutes, then (at this point there was some mis-understanding on my part) return to be covered in the Dead Sea mud, we would keep this on our skin for about 15 minutes and then we would rinse off back in the Dead Sea.  

I headed down to the water (Aimee chose to spectate instead of participate) and began soaking.  As I walked in, the other hotel guest was still wading torso deep in the water, about 20 feet from the beach.  The water was warmer than I had anticipated (though at this low elevation the temperatures maintained 70-80 degrees, unlike the rest of our stay in the country)  I began to walk towards him, and as soon as the water got to my knees, it felt like there were two hands on the back of my calves gently pushing me up.  This was certainly unlike anything I'd experienced in a lake or an ocean.  I continued to walk out in the direction of the other individual, and as the water rose past my belly button, my footsteps began to be much lighter and suddenly I was not touching the bottom, even though the surface was only between my belly button and chest.  I now realized the other individual that I thought was wading was actually floating!  (as I now was). 

It became more and more apparent how unique this experience was from any "swimming" I'd ever done elsewhere.  The water had a slightly more "slippery" feel than ocean or lake water.  As I tried to maintain my balance using my feet and arms as I normally would, I bent my knees so I could paddle slightly with my feet, and suddenly I flipped backwards into a sitting position with my knees poking out of the surface.  I struggled to put my feet under me, but as I did, the strong buoyancy tried to make me lay flat instead of go back to a vertical position.  It took quite a bit of effort to get my feet under me and my body back into a vertical position.  Once I achieved it, I instinctively bent my knees again, and flipped back to a sitting position with my knees in front of me.  Remembering now that I was supposed to soak all of my skin for 15 minutes, I began to realize that was actually difficult to do, since so much of my body was above the surface and refused to go down.  

After approximately 15 minutes, I determined it was time for the mud.  Unfortunately I didn't realize until later the attendants were actually prepared to do the next step for me.  I dug around the floor of the Dead Sea in the shallower end.  Most of it was pebbly sand, but I was able to find a few chunks of mud.  I took this mud, walked out of the water and began to apply it all over my body.  After a few minutes I was covered head to toe and I wandered around the beach for the recommended 15 minutes.  (During this time one of the attendants told me I used the wrong mud and they had better mud--which I realized they were simply harvesting from a few dozen yards down the coast away from the beach, though it was essentially the same as what I had used.)  The longer the mud sat on my skin, the more I began to feel tingles and burning, especially on the parts of my face that were still chapped and cracked from all the cold weather exposure earlier in the week.  After the appropriate wait time, I went back to the Dead Sea and rinsed off.  My skin did feel much softer and smoother after this ordeal, and I went up to the showers next to the attendants tables to rinse the rest of the saltiness off myself, somewhat disappointed that I had inadvertently skipped the massage portion of the experience. 

Aimee and I headed back up to the room, got ourselves cleaned up and put together for the day, and awaited the doctor's arrival.  Since we were showering and such, we put the "Do Not Disturb" sign on our door.  

The doctor was supposed to arrive at 11:00, however by 11:15am we still hadn't heard from him, so we called the front desk.  They let us know the doctor was there at 11:00, but since there was a "Do Not Disturb" sign, they didn't knock.  Fortunately, within minutes he was back at our door.  The doctor, and one of the front desk staff entered, swabbed what I believe was a lobe of my brain from the feel of it, and left, letting us know that our results would be available by about 8:00pm.

With this we were free to go enjoy the rest of our day.  

We jumped in the car and began driving north from the Dead Sea to the ancient Roman ruins at Jerash.  While it was sunny and warm in the upper 70s already at the coast of the Dead Sea, it didn't take long as we quickly climbed elevation and moved further north that the sky became overcast, the temperature outside dropped, and it began raining again.  The area around Jerash was a much different landscape than most of the Jordan we had experienced so far.  While it was still very hilly/mountainous, the ground was covered in green instead of the red sand or yellow rock that we had become accustomed to.  As we entered the city limits, it was clear this would be a wet and dreary day.  While it was not a downpour, there was a constant light drizzle.  

We found our way to the area of the ancient ruins, located in the center of the modern city, and began to look for a spot for lunch.  I had identified Umm Khalil Lebanese House, however as we pulled up to it, it looked a bit more upscale than what we were dressed for, and so we continued to wander and look for other options.  

Around the corner was a large restaurant called "Artemis."  We decided to give this one a try.  As we pulled in, it was clear from both the size of the restaurant and the large coach tour busses, that this was a popular place for all the tour groups.  We parked and entered.  The restaurant was a buffet with a large dining room with many tables set up for very large groups.  Aimee and I got sat at a small 6 seater along the edges.  I noticed on the menu, they had "Petra" beer available (which I had struck out a couple times when we were actually in Petra as our hotel, and the restaurant within Petra were both out of it) so I ordered one, and excitedly entered it into my Untappd app.

After replenishing our energy, we jumped back in the car, and drove around the corner to the parking lot for the ruins.  

Immediately we learned that Jerash was set up differently than Petra.  This was both good and bad.  There was a large mall of vendors that you had to walk through in order to get into the actual ruins.  We hoped this meant that the site would be devoid of aggressive souvenir touts.  (that was mostly, but not entirely, correct).  The bad part was, that you had to walk through a gauntlet of vendors and stalls with much of the same type of trinkets that were aggressively marketed to us throughout Petra.  The vendors were just as aggressive at trying to suck passersby into conversation and a "free look" at their wares.  We were really not interested in any more shopping at this point and hurriedly ran through the expansive market.  

Once we exited into the grounds of the ancient ruins we were met with the imposing Arch of Hadrian which marked the entrance to this side of the ancient city.  While there is evidence of human settlements in the area dating back to 3200 BC, and further evidence of human life another 4,000 years before that, the major developments of the area began with Alexander the Great in the 4th century BC, followed by Roman rule as an annex to Syria in the first century BC during which time most of the current ruins were built.

Arch of Hadrian

Walking through the arch, led us into the city, and along side the ancient Roman arena called the Hippodrome.  This arena had a capacity of 15,000 and was host to chariot races and other sports.  I took the opportunity to walk up to a seat in the arena, and tried to envision what it would have been like to spend a weekend here 2,000 years ago watching a chariot race.   The experience of walking under the stands, through a doorway, up to the edge of the arena and turning around and walking up the stairs to find my seat, was strangely similar to doing so in a modern stadium, causing a surreal mix of thoughts to go through my head of the parallels of attending a football game in the modern era vs. grabbing a seat for a race two millennia ago.

Seated in the Hippodrome

After leaving the Hippodrome, we continued down the long straight path that continued along the side of the stadium until we got to a large open area, ovular in shape and surrounded by tall columns.  This was the Roman Forum.  Dozens of identical roman columns surrounded the forum, most of which had beams at the top of them that connected all of them along the top.  Here we ran into our first vendor who struck up a casual conversation asking where we were from, and welcoming us to Jordan.  He then strongly encouraged me to try on a Keffiyah and was eager to take our picture.  This of course was his lead in to try and sell us some souvenirs.  After thanking him for his "kindness" we strongly insisted we were not interested in anything.   

In the distance to our left we could see the ruins of the Temple of Zeus.  We had decided we would make our way back to that on our way out of the ruins, however, in the cool misty afternoon, the impressive remains of the structure in the distance still maintained a mysterious dominating presence in the ancient city. 

Temple of Zeus looming over Jerash

We exited the forum entering Cardo Maximus, the central main colonnaded street of the ancient city.  The warm yellow hue of the stones even 2000 years after its construction hinted at what must have appeared under a bright sun as a city paved in gold.  Not much further, on the left was the Agora, a central meeting place centered around a fountain.  

The Agora

Beyond the Agora, the Cardo Maximus continued for quite some distance, past the central intersection of the old city, with ruins off to either side in various states of disrepair.  Interestingly some of the massive stone blocks and columns were set organized off the side of the main street, apparently laid for eventual restoration to their original places. 

Cardo Maximus

The Nymphaeum 

Near the area of the ruins of the Cathedral, one of the local touts, grabbed our attention to show us how the many columns were not rigidly erected where they sat, but that they each actually were designed to be able to sway.  He had a spoon, the edge of which he inserted under a column, between it and the pedastal.  With one finger he gently pushed on the spoon and showed us how the entire column would sway back and forth. This was fascinating, but we tried to quickly pull ourselves away, as we were intent on a self guided tour and had no interest in discussing souvenirs, to which all conversations seemed to lead here and the other heavily travelled tourist sites.

Continuing a bit further down the main road, we came to another intersection.  Straight ahead, the Cardo Maximus led out of the old city.  We took a left and ended up at the Northern Theater.  This building is still mostly intact (or has been restored).  Before entering the complex, we walked around the outside, and found a few small doorways.  I peaked inside and saw that they had long passageways about 5 feet high, and with quite a bit of rubble and garbage on the floor.  My adventurous side got the best of me, and I grabbed my flash light and entered.  Aimee stayed behind to watch and see if I came back out in one piece.  From my reading, I believe these passages originally led to trap doors on the stage of the theater.  I was able to make my way about 20 feet into the passage way until it turned and had quite a bit more rubble, at which point I decided to end my trek, and head back out.  

Entering the Tunnel

Aimee Patiently Waiting for my Return

Aimee and I then went into the main entrance, which brought us to a massive hallway that led to large steps leading up to the back of the theater.  The ancient architecture with large arched hallways was incredibly awe inspiring to see.  Once we got to the top we walked into the top row of the theater's seating area and had a perfect view of the marble floor in front of the stage, and the stage itself.  

Northern Theater

From here we turned back to head towards where we came in, but returned along the backside of the city.  Along this pathway we could see the ruins of several old churches from the ancient city, the Temple of Artemis, and the many columns around the site of the Church of St. Theodore.  

The Forum from a distance

Beyond these we walked a bit further toward the Temple of Zeus.   Before arriving at that imposing site however, we stopped at the Southern Theater.  This theater was a bit larger than the Northern Theater, but similar in design.  We heard some music coming from inside that sounded like Scottish bagpipes.  We were surprised when we got in to see that they were being played by a line of Jordanian men.  They were just finishing up as we we walked in, and as the broke, a line of Indian (I think) men on the floor of the theater began singing mariachi songs.  The cross culture music from both groups left us entertained, if not a slight bit confused.

Southern Theater

Our final stop was the temple of Zeus.  The ruins of this large temple sat high upon a hill, and had served well as our constant point of reference as it could be seen from most parts of the massive ancient city.  This temple at the highest point of the ancient city originally had 17 massive columns.   While the remains themselves were impressive, climbing up to the temple and taking a moment to enjoy the view of the entire ancient city was equally impressive. 

Temple of Zeus

Inside the Temple of Zeus

View from Temple of Zeus

This essentially concluded our tour of Jerash.  We took our last few glimpses and returned back to the path that led out of the city and back to our car, embarking on the ~90 minute drive back to our hotel.  The later half of this drive took us through the heavily ridden highways of Amman, and I will admit I had a bit of pride in how well I'd adapted to the driving culture in the country, which in general had far more loose adherence to lane markings, shoulders etc., (thought not quite as loose as places such as India...though I thought it was a good first step towards someday attempting to drive in India!)

As we neared the hotel district, we saw a very large souvenir store.  We decided to stop in here and see if they had any nicer items than what we saw from all the touts and souvenir stands near the attractions.  It was near closing time, and it was fairly empty inside, but with thousands upon thousands of items. Most of which were the same t-shirts, books, and trinkets we saw throughout the coutnry, but with a few displays of higher end items such as carved/inlaid furniture, dishes, mosaics, etc.  At one point I noticed one of the workers was talking to some other tourists in french.  I asked how many languages he spoke, and he said he could speak Russian, Spanish, Indonesian, Portuguese, and French (and of course Arabic).  Given the current events of the prior week in Ukraine, he then caught himself and said "I don't speak Russian anymore."  We spent a good bit of time in the large store, and talking to the store owners.  The one individual I was talking to said his dream was to come to and work in America.  He said that in America you can do anything you want to do, if you work for it.  At one point he offered me some tea.  I felt bad, as it somewhat goes against social norms, but I declined, as we did need to get back, grab dinner, and pack up.

After buying a few trinkets at the store, we returned to our hotel, cleaned ourselves up, and headed to the Italian restaurant on the grounds for our final dinner in Jordan.  Given the regionally warm weather near the banks of the Dead Sea, we were able to enjoy our dinner, and a bottle of the local Jordan River Reserve wine, al fresco.  Only a few other tables were filled with diners this evening, making for very peaceful surroundings.  We were not looking forward to the long flight back and returning to reality---especially having already experienced the very cramped Royal Jordanian Airlines accommodations.  Nonetheless, we forced ourselves back to our room, packed our suitcases, and headed to sleep for a few hours before driving to the airport, and returning home to the US.

One more adventured completed.

.  

Northward Along the Dead Sea Highway

Thursday's agenda included another cross country drive, back to the northern part of Jordan for our 8th Day.  The previous week we had crossed the country on the Desert Highway through Central Jordan.  Today we were heading north on the Dead Sea Highway, along the western edge of the Country.  Our schedule was a bit more flexible, since we could ultimately check into our hotel at any point in the evening, though if possible I had planned dinner at the Panorama Restaurant that was supposed to have a fantastic view of the sunset behind the Dead Sea.

We got started about an hour later than we had planned, and looked at our agenda to see if there was anywhere to make up sometime.  While it wasn't a strict timeline, there were a lot of small sites to stop and look at along the drive and if we wanted to see all of them we knew we'd have to move quickly through the day.  

The first spot on our list was Shobak Castle, also known as Montreal Castle.  This castle was built in 1115 by the Crusaders, but fell to the muslim sultans less than a century later.  As we neared the castle, we could see it's imposing outer walls off in the distance. We first pulled into the visitor center, parked, and went inside.  We were greeted by a very cheerful elderly Jordanian that greeted us with a huge smile, but did not speak very good English.  We saw there was a path out the other side of the visitor center, and we asked if we go that way to get to it, and he said, "No, wait for the caravan." and pointed back where we came.  So we walked back out and waited.  After 10 minutes or so, and no caravan, we began to wonder if we could simply drive ourselves, so we went back in and found the old man, and asked if we could drive.  He responded "Yes! But only if you drive slowly.  Drive very slowly!" 

Shobak Castle (Montreal)

With this, we jumped in the car, and drove to the front of the castle.  As we walked in the front gates, it was clear that much of the castle was in significant ruin.  There were still a few rooms and a few passageways that had full walls and ceilings, but much of the castle was made up of only partial walls, and parts of rooms.  

As we walked around, there was a tour guide giving a tour to some other tourists. At one point he walked past us and asked where we were from, we answered, and he continued on his way.  However, once he finished with the tourists he was working with, he came and found us and offered us a tour as well.  We obliged, and he guided us through the castle.  

Arabic Inscriptions on Walls

One of the things that our Lonely Planet guide book recommended, was that there was a very long dark passageway of several hundred steps that went down to one of the water cisterns.  At one point I found a room with  a section of the floor that caved in, and I could see there was a narrow tunnel below it, only about 3 feet wide and 6 feet tall.  I wondered if this was the tunnel the book spoke of.  I could have easily jumped down into it, however, getting back out seemed difficult.  Later we came across a small stairway that led down to a passageway that was blocked off by a padlocked door.  I asked our guide if this was the tunnel that led down a cellar deep underneath the castle. He said yes, but it has been locked recently because it is no longer safe.  I told him I had been hoping to check that out.  He replied "yes, all the tourists always want to see that."  I told him that it was because the guidebook suggests exploring that tunnel.  Unfortunately, I wouldn't be exploring that today.  (He did confirm that they section I saw in the other room was indeed that same tunnel.)

Entry Passage to the Cellar

It didn't take much imagination to see that this was once a magnificent castle.  It was still impressive to walk through some of the arched doorways and look in some of the ancient rooms throughout, and envision the complex being full of knights, royalty, and all the rest.   From the top of the castle you could see an incredible distance.  Far off in the distance was a new modern sight that had been added:  wind farms with large wind turbines slowly spinning. 

View from Shobak Castle

After paying our tour guide, and taking a few final pictures, we headed out from the castle.  There was an obscure site that I had seen a few videos of online that I was hoping to stop and see just outside this castle.  There is an older gentleman that offers a room "for rent" at the World's Smallest Hotel.  It is along side the road leaving Shobak castle.  His "hotel" is nothing more than an old VW beetle.  The inside has a small mat in it, that technically one could sleep on.  Before the trip I had read a couple other blogs that mentioned he was a very quirky individual and that if you stopped to talk to him he would of course share some tea with you.  We unfortunately had to make up time, so we didn't stop and talk with him.  We did get a quick picture as we went past however.

"Worlds Smallest Hotel" (the Car in the center)

No Time to Check in :-(

After we left Shobak castle, we began a long slow descent out of the mountains, down towards the area of the Dead Sea.  The lowest point on the earth.  The drive (as with many drives throughout Jordan) provided some fantastic views were you could see for 10s of miles off in the distance.  

Descending to the Lowest Point of the Earth

We were heading to a small museum, called the "Museum at the Lowest Place on Earth".  The museum was small and had some interesting artifacts from the region, some that were 5000 years old.  However more interesting to me was that behind the museum was a path that would take you to "Lot's cave."  If you are not familiar with the Old Testament bible story of Genesis 19 in which the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah were destroyed, and Lot fled with his wife and daughters (though his wife didn't make it) to a cave.  The cave behind this museum is believe to be the cave that Lot lived in with his wife.

Pottery Vessels from Lots Cave

The cave is up several flights of stairs carved into the mountainside.  About 1600 years ago, a basilica was built around the entrance to the cave, and the ruins of this are there to see as well.  As we got half way up, an older coming down and said "Don't bother.  It's closed off anyway."  We continued undeterred.  

When we got to the top, there was indeed a metal gate around the entire area.  We walked around looking inside, and were about to turn around and head down when Aimee pointed out "Hey, this section is open.  You can walk right in!"  Sure enough, right in front of us was a doorway through the metal fencing.  We weren't sure if it was meant to be closed off or not...but it wasn't.  So we went inside.

Doorway to Lot's Cave (Doorway built around the 5th Century)

When the basilica was built in Lot's honor, they built a doorway in front of the cave entrance, I walked through this, and was in what could only be described as an old cave.  There wasn't much room in it.   From the entry way, there was a section that went down another 8 feet to the left, and had just enough room perhaps for a person to lay.  The back of the cave went another 10 or 15 feet, and got smaller and smaller and then ended in some rocks.  It looked like perhaps it used to go back farther, but it was hard to tell.  Having grown up learning this story, and knowing of Lot, and how long ago that story took place, the reality suddenly settled in of standing in (what is believed to be) the exactly location of an event that I've read about in the bible---and a story that is 5,000 years old.  That was the first time I've ever had an experience like that and it did give me some goosebumps.

Exploring Lots Cave

Pit to the Left of Entrance (about 8 feet deep)

View from Lots Cave

After walking back down the steps from Lot's cave and getting back in our car, it was time to grab some lunch before hitting our next site.  In this part of Jordan, there is an abundance of agricultural farms, potash farms, and salt farms, and is a very busy "working class" type area.  Interestingly, coming from Lot's cave, it is this area that is believed to be the sites of Sodom and Gomorrah.  The exact sites are not known, but it is clear that it is somewhere in the plains just south of the Dead Sea.  It was in this approximate location, in the town of Gawr al Mazraah that we found a small roadside restaurant to grab some lunch.  Unfortunately, given the makeup of the area, there is not much of any English.  So we wandered in to one restaurant, and glanced down at the food behind the counter, not quite knowing what to ask for.  Fortunately, another individual (who I believe was Jordanian) walked in and ordered a falafel wrap.  We took the easy route, and simply pointed to his when he was done, and asked for "Thineen", which is Arabic for "Two".  I saw they also had french fries, which I did know the arabic word for (batata) and so I asked for some of those as well.  The gentleman behind the counter smiled and motioned for us to have a seat, and whipped up a couple wraps while we grabbed a couple cans of fruit nectar.   

I had noticed at this point, even local "fast food" type places would not ask for money until we had eaten our food.  I had to remind myself not to forget to pay.  The total was only JOD3.250--slightly less than $5 US.  (This reminded me that when you're not in the touristy areas, the cost of things in Jordan is incredibly affordable.)  I only had a 20 JOD note in my wallet, which unfortunately they did not have change.  However at the same time another local man came in at the same time, and after a quick conversation with the guy at the restaurant counter offered to run to one of the other shops to make change.  After about 3 or 4 minutes, he returned and provided smaller bills so they could provide me accurate change.  

Lunch Spot in Gawr al Mazraah

After our lunch, we headed back up in the mountains to the town of Karak, to see Karak castle.  The views as we headed up the mountain were stunning.  Much of this area was actually green and fertile.  As we got up to the city although the population is not huge, it is built very densely, with extremely narrow streets at almost unbelievable inclines, blind corners, and quite a bit of traffic.  We found our way to the castle which looked to be incredibly busy, and were lucky to find a parking spot right in front of it.  A server from the cafe across from the castle came out to help guide us to our parking spot.  When we got out, he asked if we wanted to stop in the cafe.  When we said "no thank you, we are going to the castle" he immediately offered to be our guide.  His price was reasonable (and matched what my guidebook said was the approximate cost) and so we agreed. 

Entry Over Moat to Karak Castle

We entered into the castle as several large tour groups were assembling and getting ready to enter.  We quickly got ahead of them, so as we wouldn't be bogged down by the large crowd.  Once we got inside were astonished at what we saw.  Unlike Shobak, Karak castle was still in tact for the most part.  Our guide told us that it had seven different floors.  His English was fairly poor (and we also found his knowledge of the castle was not very good either, unfortunately.) and we didn't believe him at first, but as we went throughout the complex and began counting, sure enough there were seven floors.  It was amazing to me that a structure almost 1000 years old, (built in the 1140s) could have enclosed rooms on multiple floors.  

At the far end of the complex was a narrow section that rose up three floors from the surrounding area.  There were stairs that led up to this section, but they were blocked off.  Our guide explained to us, that there was recently a professor that had fallen from that section and died, so they no longer let anyone go up to that area.

Passageway Between Floors

Kitchen

We were feeling a bit rushed by our guide, and since he wasn't actually helpful in his tour we ultimately thanked him and let him know we were going to spend a little more time wandering through the complex on our own.  As we found our way out of the castle we noted that earlier in the day we had talked about skipping this castle if we ran short of time.  We were quite glad that we were able to fit it in, as it was indeed worth the trip.

View from Karak Castle

Surrounding Area of Karak

The rest of the day was intended to drive along the coast of the Dead Sea.  Lonely Planet referenced a few different places to stop and see, however we were running out of daylight.  The sun was already setting on the other side of the Dead Sea, and we determined we wouldn't make it to the restaurant in time to watch it during dinner.  Instead we decided to pull over and take in the sunset from here, and simply go to the hotel restaurant once we checked in at the Dead Sea Hilton.

Sunsetting Behind the Dead Sea

It was clear that this was a popular thing to do in this area, as we saw many cars parked and people down at the shores also watching the sunset.  The cool spring air and the somewhat warm water made for a very hazy atmosphere, creating layers of pastel pinks and blues both in the sky as well as reflected in the still waters of the Dead Sea as the sun set behind the mountains in Israel on the other side.

Dead Sea at Sunset

After taking in this peaceful sight for awhile we made our way to our hotel and checked in.  We were pleased to have been upgraded to a larger room overlooking the Dead  Sea, and they also informed us that in 20 minutes there would be a fireworks show to celebrate the 5 year anniversary of the hotel.  We brought our luggage to our room, just in time to watch the fireworks, grabbed a quick dinner and turned in for the night.  

View of the Fireworks from our Room